1. Field
The present invention relates to communication and/or computer networks, and more particularly to Virtual Private Networks.
2. Related Art
A physical network, such as a service provider network topology, may include a large number of nodes. These nodes may include peripherally located provider edge routers, each of which couples to one or multiple customer edge routers. The customer edge routers, in turn, may couple to private local area networks associated with one or multiple customers. Typically, the service provider network selectively couples the local area networks to each other through links created between its provider edge routers.
A Virtual Private Network (“VPN”) enables a secure exchange of certain traffic between nodes of the physical network without having to dedicate such nodes to only carrying out the secure exchange. The VPN enables such secure exchange by encrypting the certain traffic (“secured traffic”) to protect against eavesdropping and tampering by unauthorized parties. Because resources of the network are shared between the secured traffic and un-secured traffic, costs of using the resources are generally reduced for each of many users of the network.